SOME RARE KINDS OF CARDAMOM. 93 



Of the pharmaceutical preparations of olive bark, the more 

 useful appear to be a tincture and an alcoholic extract. The Therapeutic 

 tincture is recommended to be made by digesting one part of oH^barl 

 the young bark in eight parts of spirit of wine of sp. gr. -867. and leaves - 

 It may be administered as Tinctura cinchonce. The dose of the 

 extract is half a drachm diffused through a little water. 1 



The varied and independent testimonies in favour of the 

 febrifuge properties of the olive, seem to render it deserving of 

 a more extended investigation, both as to its medicinal and its 

 chemical properties. The Vauqueline of Pallas should be re- 

 examined, and its connexion with the crystallizable principles 

 obtainable from allied plants should be studied. 



That some therapeutic value does really attach to the bark 

 and leaves of the olive is supported by the fact that both the 

 lilac (Syringa vulgaris, L.) and the ash (Fraxinus excelsior, L.), 

 plants of the same natural order, are reputed to possess febrifuge 

 properties, and employed on that account in some parts of the 

 Continent. 



ON SOME KAKE KINDS OF CARDAMOM. 



(Seltene Cardamomen.) 



" Nulla res est fortasse in re Pharmaceutica magis litigiata quam Cardamomi 

 notitia." GEOFFROY, Tractatus de Materid Medicd, t. ii., p. 364. 



THE natural history of the various fruits of the order Zinyi- 

 leracece, grouped together under the name of Cardamom, has 

 always proved a subject of difficulty to pharmacologists. Prob- 

 ably one cause of this is the imperfect manner in which botani- 

 cal specimens of these plants have been preserved (occasioned 

 principally by the succulent nature of their flowers and fruits), 

 and a second may be due to the fact that comparatively but few 

 botanists have been able to labour for a sufficient length of time 



by Landerer Olivine (Turner's Chemistry, 7th ed., 1842, p. 1125). The 

 latter name is however objectionable, it having been applied to two other 

 bodies, namely, to the olive-green crystalline substance obtained by the 

 action of sulphuric acid on Salicine, and to a variety of the mineral 

 Chrysolite. 

 1 (Jhereau, in Journal de Chimie Medicale, tome iv. (1828), pp. 543-546. 



